


and then there were three

by ElephantKhaleesi



Series: countdown [1]
Category: Hockey RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Anal Sex, Crack, Crack and Angst, Deception, Fingering, M/M, Multi, Polyamory, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, because im me it ended up being, i just wanted to write something light hearted and funny but, some dick stuff, thats such a dramatic tag
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-10
Updated: 2016-10-10
Packaged: 2018-08-17 12:25:52
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,037
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8144003
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ElephantKhaleesi/pseuds/ElephantKhaleesi
Summary: It was weird to think about the other Jonathan that would one day come into his life and, fucking whatever, complete it, like in the romance movies, especially when the Jonathan he had seemed to fill up all of the nooks and crannies in his life already.--The working title for this was, "soulmate crack fic".





	

**Author's Note:**

> Deception: One male character deliberately lies, and hides a truth involving another male character from that male character.
> 
> Polyamory: Three male characters are involved in a requited sexual and romantic relationship.
> 
> Soulmate AU/Soulmate Identifying Marks: Fic takes place in a 'verse where everyone has soulmate marks (their soulmate's signature) that slowly fade in as they age, typically they fully fade in around 6 years old, amount of marks per person varies, they are always reciprocated, always romantic though not necessarily sexual in nature, and some people (aromantic, ect.) are born without any.
> 
> Anal Sex/Fingering: Three male characters engage in consensual penetrative anal sexual intercourse.

He found out by accident. 

Pat’s had the name Jonathan scrawled messily across his left collarbone for as long as he could remember, and when he first got drafted to the Chicago Blackhawks and met one Jonathan Toews, he thought that was it, boom, soulmate found. At the start, he’d tried to hint a little, didn’t go so far as to outright ask what Jonny’s mark was, if Pat’s name took up a part of Jonny too, because his mother raised him right, goddammit, and that was just rude, but when Jonny didn't seem to get the hints he stepped up his game and made sure the next time in the locker room that he hovered around Jonny’s stall shirtless, mark bold against his clavicle. 

But Jonny didn’t say anything, his eyes caught on Pat’s collarbone but they didn’t light up when he saw his mark, he didn’t rip his own clothes off in a rush to show Pat that he had his name too, didn’t do any of that, just dropped his head down and kept pulling his pads on, throwing out a “Sup, Pat” like he wasn’t crushing Patrick’s hopes under his heel. But, whatever, you know, Jon just must not be Pat’s soulmate. Even if over their years together on the ice, over their cup wins and losses, over their off seasons and in the early mornings on the road Pat really, really wished he was. 

It was weird to think about the other Jonathan that would one day come into his life and, fucking whatever, complete it, like in the romance movies, especially when the Jonathan he had seemed to fill up all of the nooks and crannies in his life already. He tried not to think that way, it wasn’t fair to his soulmate and it wasn’t fair to Jonny’s soulmate, whoever that was. Pat still hadn’t seen Jonathan’s mark, he wore soulmate covers religiously over his right pectoral, and sometimes Pat would lay in bed wondering whose name it was, if it was a James or a Bianca or a Damian. He didn’t do that often, or for very long, it hurt too much, and the heartache always made him feel guilty and selfish for wanting more than his soulmate. Whomever he was.

Now, they’ve won the cup again and the team is on fire with it. They’re at Seab’s place for one last farewell barbeque before they all go their separate ways for the offseason and they’re all already on their way to drunk. There’s a rally to all get into the pool for what seems to be a game of horse but Pat isn’t really paying attention, he’s distracted by Jonny heading inside and before he knows it his feet are following. When he gets inside Jonny isn’t anywhere in sight, so Pat wonders around, peeking in the kitchen and family room, then heading down the hallway to the bathroom and guest room. Lo and behold, the door to the guest room is ajar and Pat grins mischievously to himself, prepared to jump into the room and scare Jonny, or some other half baked plan, he just knows that it’ll piss Jonny off. 

He pushes open the door the rest of the way and it bangs loudly against the wall, but whatever Patrick was planning on saying dies on his lips because Jonny’s standing there looking like he’s been caught red handed, eyes wide and startled. He’s shirtless (Pat thinks that maybe it’s hanging off the edge of the bed), unwrapping one of those adhesive stick-on mark covers, and Pat doesn’t think he can breathe. Because Jonny’s soulmate mark is right there, on his upper pectoral and it’s fucking Patrick. It’s in his girly fucking handwriting and he can’t fucking believe this, all those nights spent lying on his back wondering whose name Jonny had and it was his. 

It feels like someone’s squeezing his heart and he doesn’t understand, Jonny’s seen his name on Pat, he knows, he must, and he still didn’t, didn’t say anything or tell Pat. The hot wash of rejection floods him and he can feel his eyes prickling with tears. He didn’t think he was so bad, so awful that Jonny would rather live his life fucking hiding from him than try being with him. Jonny jerks into movement, tearing his shirt off the bed and pulling it over his head, saying “Jesus Christ, Pat, could you fucking knock?” 

Pat’s face heats with shame (his mother would have killed him for barging in on someone changing, especially someone changing their mark cover, names were private, they weren’t for random prying eyes) and he quickly stutters out, “’I’m sorry, I was just, wait, why didn’t you tell me?”

It comes out far more hurt and frightened than he intended it to (thank god his voice didn’t crack), and his embarrassment of it fuels his anger. Because what the fuck? How dare Jonny try to shame Pat for being inconsiderate, he’s been fucking hiding that they’re literal fucking soulmates for years, since they were rookies, when Pat bared his mark for Jonny that first time, hopeful and desperate and so, so sure. He remembers standing in front of Jonny’s stall, he thought he’d been so stupid and naive, fuck. He doesn’t, he doesn’t understand and he’s got too many emotions inside him to try to separate them or identify them, he just wants to scream and cry and punch Jonny in the fucking face. 

He thinks about the shame and guilt he felt when he was with Jonny, thinks about the first time he looked at Jonny from across the ice and knew he loved him, thinks about the way it made him hate himself a little, for not being able to be content with his soulmate, for wanting more, for being selfish. About how cruel he was being to the soulmate he thought he hadn’t met, for being in love with someone else. Remembers the nights he spent drinking until he couldn’t tell up from down, much less who he was in love with. (Someone who was going to meet his someone else one day, his soulmate, fall in love and make a life with the person he was meant to be with, a person who wasn’t Pat.) 

He doesn’t think he’s ever been this angry in his life, much less this angry with Jon. He wants to tell him, wants to spew out all the hurt and anger and betrayal and frustration he feels, wants Jonny to understand exactly what he’s made Pat go through all these years, intentional or not. He doesn’t get his chance to though, Jon is shouldering past him and out the door without so much as a word to Pat. 

He chases him out of the room, asking, ”Where the fuck do you think you’re going?” and then shouting, “We're not done talking about this, asshole!” down the hallway after his retreating back.

He stands there for a long time, breathing heavily, staring down the hallway. He leaves right after, he doesn’t say goodbye to any of the guys but he figures neither did Jonny, so at least they’re both assholes. He tries to put everything he’s feeling into a box and lock it up, but it doesn’t work too well, the box is too small, it’s overflowing and by the time he’s gotten home he’s crying. He heads straight to his bed and curls under the covers and tries to disappear. He drifts in and out of sleep, and the whole while he thinks about Jonny, about himself, about them together. He wants to call his sisters, pour his heart out and feel better listening to Erica threaten Jon’s life. He wants to call Mrs. Toews, ask her why her son’s a douchebag and if he’s always been that way or if Pat just gets special treatment. It isn’t pretty basically, he spends hours wondering what it is about him that Jonny hated so much. Hates so much. 

The next morning he wakes up with crusties in his eyes, feeling sore and tired. He gets ready though, like he does everyday, and he decides to handle this like he does every problem. By ignoring it.

\--

Jonny feels like shit. He’s sitting on the edge of his bed with his elbows on his knees, hands clutched together, and eyes squeezed tight. Like if he closes them shut enough, hard enough, everything else will go away. It isn’t working, he can still see the fucking look on Pat’s face when he walked in on Jon changing. He wants to throw up. He’d done so well, he can’t stop replaying it over and over again. Can’t believe he forgot to close the fucking door. 

He stands up and heads to the bathroom, shedding clothes along the way (it would drive Pat up a wall, he hates when Jonny’s messy, always went around picking up his water bottles and clothes from around their room, mumbling and grumbling threateningly in Jon’s direction as he did, and it feels like there’s water boiling in Jonny’s stomach, he doesn’t know how he’s going to fix this) to the shower. He reaches in to start it, and as he waits for the water to heat (he wants to burn off this day from his skin, wants it to blister and peel and slide down the drain and disappear) he catches his reflection in the mirror. 

It’s solidifying, a reminder to why he couldn’t tell Pat (why he’s been hiding, hiding, hiding), he runs his fingers over the neat penmanship slanted on his right pectoral (Patrick once made fun of him for it, that his mark was on his “tiddy”), before he drops his hand lower to his thigh, drags his thumb over the foreign letters there. (When he was a kid he didn’t understand, it wasn’t until he was a teenager that he spent hours on google translate, trying to pronounce the strange Russian letters). 

He has two names marked on his body, which isn’t the problem, multiple names aren’t common per say, but they aren’t rare either. When Jonny was a boy his mother made him have a playdate with a girl down the street because she had three parents, told him that that’s what he’d have too one day. He remembers spending more time watching the three women interact than he did playing with their daughter, fascinated by the way soulmates could complete tasks seamlessly, never once bumping into each other as they bustled around the kitchen making lunch. 

His having two names isn’t the problem, the problem is Pat doesn’t have two names. He doesn’t know why (marks don’t work that way, he’s never even heard of an unreciprocated soulmate before, it was the whole point of them, people perfect for each other, whether it was two or three or even four), but he knows Pat only has his name. And he can’t. He can’t do that to Pat.

He just wants to protect him, from that pain, from that heart ache (he needs to, it's branded in his bones as surely as Pat's name is branded on his skin, his desire to protect him feels as hard wired as his need to eat or sleep) and he’d rather live his whole life without either of his soulmates (even though it feels like he can't breathe as it is, Pat's hurt is immortalized in Jonny’s fucking brain, he's already obsessing, and he can feel it buzz unpleasantly under his skin, his soulmate’s pain) than put him in that position.

One day his second soulmate will come into his life, (he wonders if Artemi has Pat’s mark too, or, like Pat, he only has one of theirs) and he can’t do that to either of them. Patrick deserves someone who will be able to love him completely and exclusively, because he’s going to meet and love his other soulmate just as wholey and consumingly as he loves Pat already, he knows that. Jonny can’t make Pat share him, he can’t.

He looks away from the mirror and steps into the scalding spray of the shower, and tries to convince himself that it’s better this way. His stomach is still filled with a heavy lead and his heart feels like it’s trying to crawl its way up his throat, but at least like this he can pretend that the water tracking down his face is from the shower spray.

\--

Artemi gets picked up by the Blackhawks that summer, and his excitement is overshadowed only by what he feels when he realizes that both a Jonathan and a Patrick are on his new team. He knows it has to be them, his others (soulmates, that’s what his grandfather said they call them in the west). He spends hours imagining how it will be when they all meet, each scenario more outlandish and fantastical than the next. 

Training camp can't come soon enough, his thoughts caught and tangled on his others. When finally he’s on a flight to the U.S., he spends the whole while wondering where his marks are on Patrick and Jonathan.

Which is why, suffice to say, when he arrives in Chicago (and it fills his heart, this place that’s now his home, that will be his home till the end of his and his others’ days), and rushes to his first day of training camp, to discover that his others (and yes, he can tell, he knows they’re his in his bones, in the way his eyes seek them out in the locker room, in the way his breath catches inside his throat, he knows) are neither looking at each other, nor him, in a pointed manner that can only be intentional, he can’t even bring himself to be disappointed, just confused and a little irritated. 

His irritation lessons, and his confusion doubles, when he catches Patrick’s gaze (pretty blue eyes drawn to him, trapped when he finds Artemi already looking at him, like a deer caught in headlights) and sees his brow furrow, watches him blink rapidly like he’s waking from a daze, then wrenches his head away to look at Coach Quenneville, who is talking about something, but Artemi’s English isn’t good enough to catch the quick words even if he was trying to listen.  
Discomfort sits heavy in his gut. There was no recognition in Patrick’s eyes, only confusion (much like his own, none of this is sitting right with him, and he knows from the way Jonathan’s gaze is boring into the coaches forehead, the way the tick in his jaw bounces from how tightly he’s clenching his teeth, that his gut is not wrong). 

He spends the rest of the day, quietly troubled, his frustration mounting each time he tries to get one (or both) of them alone to talk. It is obvious Jonathan is avoiding him, Artemi can barely take one step in his direction before he’s fleeing in the opposite(it is starting to feel like repulsion, and it chafes against his heart, he doesn’t know what is wrong with Jonathan, but he is certainly intent to find out). 

Patrick proves to be easier to approach, even though the lack of recognition turns out to be it’s own kind of hell. When Artemi skates up to him, and quietly bumps their shoulders together to get his attention, Patrick shares a bright smile with him, easily turning his focus on him and saying ,”Hey, Artemi right? You’re a new guy.”

And Artemi wants to snarl, because he isn’t just a new guy, he’s his other. In all the ridiculous envisionings he’d had of their first meeting, being recognized (and really, how many Artemis could they really have met in America?) was not among them. He refrains, but he can tell from the funny look that crosses over Patrick’s face that he wasn’t entirely successful in controlling his facial expression. He clears his throat, then, “Ah, yes, but, call me Temi. It’s Patrick, yeah?”

Patrick smiles and tests out the nickname on his tongue, before adding, “Well, then you can call me Pat.”

He can’t help the way his smile brightens to 1000 kilowatts, and he can only hope that the way Pat looks like someone struck him across the face is a good sign. Unfortunately, their conversation ends there, the coach’s whistle signalling a start to the training drills. And, despite his best efforts, he doesn’t manage to find another moment with Pat (though he does corner Jonathan, and he could crow on the ice at the victory, but it’s short lived, as another player crashes into the both of them, thinking they were going for a celly; it is its own victory, however, to hear the sharp inhale from Jonathan when they inadvertently end up smooshed together, he hopes that is a good sign as well.)

The rest of the day drags on. He has seen neither hide nor hair of Jonathan since their brief interaction, and since the first day is mainly solo drill exercises, he doesn’t even get to experience what playing with either of them is like. (And oh, his others being hockey players, hockey players on his own team even, had definitely been in his wildest fantasies, so he supposes, reluctantly, that he can allow their strange and rather lackluster meeting).

It finally ends, and he strips his gear off quickly and efficiently, only slowing down when he see the ridiculously slow way Jonathan is changing and knows that he intends to talk after the rest of the room has cleared. The fact that Pat isn’t aware of this plan doesn’t escape his notice, and the sharp, jerky, almost angry motions he takes his gear off with give Temi pause.

He catches Pat’s elbow as he pulls up his shorts (and really, Temi is a fucking saint, kept his eyes carefully averted from where they wanted to track down, down, down), asking, “We talk, after?”

Pat blinks confusedly at him, before nodding slowly, “Uh, yeah sure.“ Temi smiles and thumps his back enthusiastically. The locker room empties fairly quickly after that, guys quickly grouping together to go out, and some throwing their partings over their shoulder as they head home solo. 

By the time Temi has zipped up his duffle bag, Pat is hovering nervously by his stall, pointedly looking everywhere in the locker room except Jonathan, and Jonathan is standing stiff and awkward, like he doesn’t know what to do with his limbs. Temi smiles (the bright, blinding one that makes him look too fucking young) and asks, “Soulmates, yes?”

There is a long heavy silence after, and Temi knows, he fucking knows he’s right, but Pat is looking at him like he’s got two heads and Jonathan’s face is twisted up in a cringe like he said something embarrassing. He clears his throat, thinking maybe they didn’t understand him, and tries to clarify, “My soulmates?”

He thinks Pat says something along the lines of, “What the fuck?” but he isn’t sure, he’s too focused on the way Jonathan lurches towards him and grabs his arm and tries to tug him off to the side, already speaking in low tones that are just a bit too fast for Temi to properly understand. He’s spent years learning English, when he was young and asked his mother why his marks looked so weird she’d smiled at him and explained that they weren’t Russian, that one day he’d travel far for them. He’d enrolled in English courses the second he could, but his four years in secondary school still aren’t enough to catch the quick words spilling out of Jonny’s mouth. (The funny accent doesn’t help either.) He’s confused, he doesn’t understand why this is so hard, in Russia people show off their marks, it's a source of pride, of belonging, and all the better on display to find their others. He means to ask Jonathan to slow down a little, but before he can get the chance to Pat has his hand fisted in the front of Jonathan’s shirt and he’s all but dragging him down so they’re face to face. He’s leaned up onto the balls of his feet (Temi hesitates to say tiptoes, he somehow knows that Pat wouldn’t like it; and it curls all warm and content in his belly that he has them, that he just knows things now) and practically screams in Jonathan’s face, “What the actual shit?”

He’s all red faced, Temi gets the feeling that this is about more than Jonathan trying to talk to him privately, but it sits odd in his belly, a discomfort at seeing one of his others upset. 

“Why don’t you actually fucking talk to me, like a real life human fucking being? Why do you have to fucking lie to me?” 

Temi doesn’t think anyone has lied so far, but there’s a vein popping out on the side of Jonathan’s head and Temi doesn’t want to make them angrier. He wants to interfere, deescalate the situation, but he doesn’t know how, doesn’t even really know what they’re fighting about. 

“Really? Fucking really? I’m the one that needs to fucking talk?” 

Pat’s face flushes darker with indignation, and he replies hotly, “That’s fucking different asswipe, you deserved that.”

Jonathan laughs and it sounds wrong, like it’s scraping its way out of his throat, and while Temi has never heard him laugh before he can tell by the spooked look on Pat’s face that that’s wrong. Pat’s jaw clenches and unclenches, and he says, “No, you- you lied to me. Don’t act like I’m the one that's fucked you over, you-” He cuts off suddenly, and his teeth clack forcefully together as his mouth closes. He lets go of Jonathan and crosses his arms against his chest defensively. His gaze is locked two inches to the left of Jonathan’s head.

Jonathan looks pained and says, “You don’t understand, but I’m sorry.”

“Then why don’t you fucking explain it to me.”

Temi isn’t 100% sure, but he thinks his others are being stupid, he doesn’t know what this fight is about, he just wants to trace his name on their skin and kiss away their frowns. He makes an impatient noise, loud enough to capture their attention then peels the top of his shorts down, revealing his right hipbone, and the chicken scratch Jonathan written across it. Jonathan makes a noise like someone’s punched him in the stomach, low and desperate but Temi can’t look away from Pat’s face. He looks shocked and confused and Temi can’t see it in his face, but he knows he’s frightened too. Pat’s hand instinctively goes up to his collarbone, he rubs at it absentmindedly, (Temi can’t help but wonder if that’s where one of his marks is, and he desperately wants to know what’s underneath his shirt) opens his mouth a few times, like he wants to say something but can’t find the words, and Artemi turns around and tugs his shirt up and off, unveiling the well penned script nestled between his shoulderblades.

He can’t see Pat’s face, but he makes an awful keening sound, like he just watched Temi jump off a bridge and not take his shirt off. He feels a light, hesitant touch along his back, like Pat’s afraid the mark will disappear into Temi’s flesh at the slightest pressure. And god, Artemi knows, in his fucking soul, that these are his others, he can feel it in the way his whole body is centered on the touch against his back. He can’t smell or taste or hear or feel anything else, just the shallow, wet breaths against the skin of his neck, and the fingertips dragging across his mark.

“I-I don’t,” the hand against Temi’s back is ripped away, and Pat sounds so small when he asks, “What’s going on?”

\--

Pat doesn’t understand what’s happening, nothing is making sense. His eyes are stuck to the stretch of flesh on Temi’s muscled back, the black swirls of his own name, in his own handwriting. He doesn’t think that’s possible, he doesn’t understand how his name, how Jonny’s name can be on this kid from Russia. Jonny steps forward then and says, “Pat,” in that awful fucking voice he uses, the one that rears its ugly fucking head when Jonny thinks Pat is injured, all soft and worried and Pat doesn’t understand.

Jonny stands there for a second, not speaking or moving, then lets out a deep sigh and hikes up his shorts, and there's a little soul mark cover, its rectangular and bandage like, and Pat’s brain is short circuiting, because his mark is on Jonny’s chest, not his thigh. He hasn’t seen it since the party, fuck he’s barely seen Jonny since the party (hasn’t spoken a single fucking word to him) but he knows it's there, has spent the entire goddamn summer tracing it in his mind, the way it sprawls along his pectoral, he couldn’t forget it if he tried, it’s been burned into the backs of his eyelids. Pat doesn’t think he can breathe because he can’t read Russian, he’s never fucking tried to (not even in Sochi, although he doesn’t remember much of Sochi at all) but he knows, in the bone deep way that soulmates do that it spells Artemi, and Pat wants to fucking scream because honestly it just looks like a bunch of fucking loops, he shouldn’t even know it's Russian. Jonny’s arms wrap around him and he shushes him and Pat wants to be angry because he’s not a fucking child that needs to be quieted when he realizes that he’s breathing like he’s just run a fucking marathon.

He shoves Jonny away from him and is flushed pink with embarrassment by the time he can finally get his breathing back under control, and he doesn’t know what to do or say, but Temi is suddenly smiling that billion watt smile at him, looking expectant and eager, and Pat feels sick because he doesn’t, he doesn’t fucking have Artemi’s name. Despite the way he tries to calm himself, his panic must show on his face because Temi’s smile falters, and the longer he stands there looking frightened and small the more Temi’s smile droops until his mouth is pulled down into a frown and he asks, “Pat?”

\--

There’s a moment where it’s impossible to tell who crumbles more, Patrick or Artemi, and Jonny feels like someone’s beating the shit out of him. He grabs onto Temi’s biceps and his brow furrows as he struggles to explain, tries to find words soft enough, can’t bring himself to just say ‘he doesn’t have your mark’, the words too blunt and cruel for the man (god he looks like a fucking kid) standing in front of him. Finally, he says, “He only has mine,” and he hopes it doesn’t feel as much like a blow to the face he’s almost positive it is.

Temi looks like he’s swallowed something sour for a moment, before he asks, “How do you know?” like it's the simplest thing in the world. Jonny stares blankly at Temi, because he just knows. He’s spent years (seasons, living together, sharing spaces, without even the privacy of a changing room) with Pat, and he’d know if he had another mark. He knows it’s not something Pat would keep quiet about, would have brought up with Jonny the second he thought they were soulmates if he did. Temi continues and asks, “You look?”

Jonny’s face immediately twists up and turns a bright, ruddy red, he looks over to Patrick who’s flushing too, gaze locked upon the floor and looking like he wished it would swallow him up. Temi smiles and nods to himself, then tells Jonny, like he’s the odd one, “We look.”

Jonny’s head feels like it's spinning and he doesn’t know how to tell Artemi that it won’t matter, Pat didn’t just misplace his mark, it's not a sock that disappeared in the wash, but Artemi looks so determined that he can’t argue when he goes over and starts tugging Pat’s clothes off like it's the most natural thing in the world.

Pat stills Artemi’s hands from where they’re attempting to tug his shirt up and over his head and says, “No, I, I don’t have, there isn’t, I’ve looked, well not that I’ve, I think I’d know if I had another mark.”

Artemi smiles and clasps Pat’s hands from where they’re fluttering about in the air between them, and gives them a reassuring squeeze, then says, “I have two, Jonny have two, you have two?”

Pat’s face scrunches up and he looks ready to put up a fight, and Jonny can barely believe himself when he jumps in and says, “What’s the harm in checking?”

He knows it's a mistake, a very, very bad mistake, the second that he sees Patrick’s face contort in anger and he twists in Artemi’s arms towards Jonny and spits, “You think I don’t know what's on my own fucking body?”

And Jonny opens his mouth to explain how that's not what he meant, that he knows it isn't there either, that he’s just trying to make this easier on everyone involved, but Pat soldiers on and Jonny finds it impossible to get a word in edgewise. 

“Fuck you Jonny, you knew about this all along, you knew you had another soulmate, you knew that we were fucking soul mates and you, you didn’t say a fucking thing, you let me think,” he cuts off suddenly and looks away from Jonny’s eyes, drops his gaze to his chin, then continues, “I’m done with you getting to decide what’s happening.”

He looks like he’s working himself up into a rant, and Jonny leans back, prepared for more, and he knows Pat’s right, he knows he deserves to have his say, but it doesn’t stop him from wanting to bundle Pat up in his arms and shake him because he was just trying to protect him from this. Artemi slides his hands up Pat’s arms in a soothing gesture Jonny is sure would have just riled him up into a rage if he had done it himself, but Pat doesn’t do more than deflate slightly, and when Artemi says,”You be mad later?” he sounds so hopeful and worried that Pat deflates all the way, his anger vanishing and leaving Pat looking tired and weary.

He huffs out a, “Fine,” then adds, “If only to prove to the both of you.”

\--

Pat takes a few steps back from the two of them, hovering indecisively for a moment before curling his hands around the hem of his shirt, squeezing his eyes shut, and pulling it over his head. God this whole thing is so fucking embarrassing, he knows damn well that the only mark he’s ever had is Jonny’s, he thinks he’d have fucking noticed if he had another. There’s a pause after Pat drops his shirt onto the ground, and he flushes at the way Temi’s looking at Jonny’s mark (scratched across his collarbone like he was in a rush). 

Pat clears his throat and catches Temi’s gaze, his face twisting into a frown as he says, “It’s the only one I have.”

Artemi doesn’t bother replying, he just steps forward and and starts pulling Pat’s shorts down. His hands shoot out to grab his wrists, and he’s blushing furiously when he pulls away from Temi and exclaims, “Oh my god, no, jesus christ, I can take my own clothes off.”

Jonny’s face contorts and honestly, he deserves a medal, this whole situation has quickly become ridiculous, but whatever sardonic quip he was planning on adding, dies in his mouth when Pat tugs his shorts down and kicks them off. He’s wearing tight, black briefs and Jonny nearly chokes on his tongue at the way they cling to him. A fucking medal. Artemi looks over his shoulder at Jonny, who’s eyes are big and dilated and asks,”You help?”.

Jonny blinks stupidly at Artemi for a moment, before swallowing loudly and nodding. He approaches slowly, let’s Pat do his thing first, removing his sandals and socks, and when Artemi makes an impatient sound and tries to get the last offending article off, Pat snatches his hands and curtly informs him that there isn’t a mark on his dick, thank you very much. Jonny can’t help but laughing at that, despite the way is makes Pat narrow his eyes at him.

Pat feels completely exposed now and painfully aware of the way both Temi and Jonny are fully clothed, but before he can do something ill advised, like demand they take off their clothes too, Artemi smiles down at him and says, “We look now,” and they do.

Jonny struggles the most with this (not that he was all that much help before) because despite the fact that they’re supposedly thoroughly checking Pat’s body for Artemi’s mark, he spends more time looking away from Patrick’s nakedness then at him. He can’t help it, the tightness of his jeans is already too much, and there’s more skin on display now then he thinks there ever has been. Even when Pat showers it isn’t like this, because there have always been rules, ones imposed by courtesy (you don’t check your teammates out in the locker room) and ones he’s imposed on himself (he’s never let himself linger on Pat, done his damnedest not to, because it wouldn’t be right to look at him like that, wouldn’t be right, and Jonny knows that if he got started he’d never stop, he’d spend an eternity watching Pat underneath the spray of water). 

Eventually though, with Artemi inspecting the front side of Patrick, (he traces his way through it, runs his fingers along Pat’s arms, his hands palm down on his chest, as if he could feel his mark, feel it raised against Pat’s skin like braille; he pays extra attention to Jonny’s mark, runs his thumb in a broad sweep across it again and again, it's no wonder that Pat is furiously red now and shifting uncomfortably as his cock is now more than halfway hard, straining against his tight, black briefs and it makes Jonny’s mouth water and pants grow impossibly tighter, he bites the insides of his cheeks as a distraction) Jonny steps behind Pat and begins to look himself, trying to find something similar to what he has on his thigh.

He doesn’t know why though, Patrick’s whole back is unblemished; there's obviously nothing there, but he does his due diligence and looks. It's hard though, to remember what he should be looking for, he gets lost in Pat's well muscled back, the pert swell of his ass, his tense thighs. Jonny wants to laugh when Artemi demands Pat lift each foot up so that he can examine their soles, determined to find his mark. His heart hurts too though, because he couldn’t imagine if Patrick or Artemi (even Artemi, he barely knows the kid, hasn’t had a real fucking conversation with him, but he can feel it like a thrum underneath his skin, in the way his eyes catch on the fan of Artemi’s eyelashes against his cheek, that he’s going to be gone for this kid, just as gone as he is for Pat) didn’t have his mark, he knows how badly Artemi wants to find it and he knows how crushed he’ll be if (when, he thinks traitorously) he doesn’t.

Nodding to himself, Jonny gets back to the task at hand more determined than before, he lifts Pat's arms to check on their underside then on the skin on his sides, finding nothing he continues downward checking as thoroughly as he can, swallowing his spit when he drops down to his knees and is eye level with Pat’s ass, the thin nylon of his underwear stretched tightly around his cheeks.

Finding nothing still Artemi huffs angrily, true frustration showing on his face, and Jonny wishes they found something, it would make everything easier if they had. Instead of giving up though, Artemi circles around toward Pat’s back, to check over where Jonny looked, he lets him and doesn’t even feel offended, he can only imagine how he must feel. Pat on the other hand tries to twist away from Artemi, “Stop, alright! You’ve looked everywhere, it's not, I don’t- i don’t have your mark Temi,” and Jonny's heart clenches a little because Pat sounds so small, and Jonny gets it, Pat wanted them to be able to find something just as much as they did. 

After a few tense beats of silence, Artemi holds Pat’s face in his hands and says, “It okay, I still have your name,” then he leans forward and kisses Pat, and oh, oh. What starts off as a chaste press of lips quickly devolves into Artemi trying to crawl into Patrick’s mouth, his hands tangled in Pat’s curls. Patrick is giving as good as he gets and he has one hand shoved into the front of Artemi’s pants and the other clawing desperately at his shoulder. Artemi breaks apart, and if he didn’t think Patrick was his other before he does now, he knows they’re meant to be he knows because he’s kissed other people before and it's never been like that. He looks over Patrick’s shoulder at Jonny, who's watching them with one hand down his own pants, stroking his length. 

“Have yours too,” and god Jonny doesn’t know whether he wants to laugh or cry but his soulmates are in front of him and Artemi is beckoning him over and Pat’s attached himself like a leech to the underside of Artemi’s jaw and he’s so hard it feels like his cock is going to burst (this is ridiculous, it feels like he’s been hard forever). He steps in behind Pat and starts kissing Artemi, and fuck, it’s good, it’s so good, he lets him push his tongue in and Jonny could do this forever, grind his dick against the curve of Pat's ass and fuck Artemi’s mouth with his tongue for the rest of his days. 

He pulls Pat back by the long column of his throat and though the angle is awkward, (and honestly so is the kiss) it feels amazing and electric and he could spend the rest of his life doing this too. (It burns in him though, how he could have had this long ago, how he made Pat wait even knowing what they were. But when they separate and he looks at Artemi, it burns differently because while he couldn’t ever imagine doing something with Pat that didn’t feel perfect and right, there’s something more now, and the guilt and worry he’d felt looking at Artemi’s name on his thigh becomes a distant memory and he doesn’t know how he could have ever thought his soulmates would be anything other than exactly what he needed).

There’s a clang from the back of the dressing room that makes the three of them jump in alarm, all of them turning bright red at the scandalized (exasperated) expression on the janitor’s face. They quickly make their excuses and Pat hastily throws his clothes back on, (Artemi struggling to pull his own perviously discarded shirt over his head) escaping out of the room and to the parking garage in a flurry of embarrassment. It isn’t until Jonny’s hovering anxiously by his car, that they stop and breathe (and think) for a moment. 

Pat turns to Temi suddenly and asks, “Wait, how did you even get here?”

And Jonny wants to bang his head on something because his soulmates are so fucking ridiculous when Temi replies, “Oh, Artem gave me ride.”

Jonny unlocks his car with the fob and gestures for Artemi to get in, throwing out to Pat, “My place?”

There’s a moment where Jonny thinks Pat is going to say no, going to go back to being angry and spurned, but the moment passes and Pat nods tentatively, turning to find his own (obnoxious, obnoxious) car. 

\--  
They do meet up at Jonny’s place, where he throws together a quick dinner for them, and it goes alarmingly (wonderfully) well; there is no mention of Pat’s lack of mark, a piece of conversation that’s carefully stepped around, but aside from those hesitant clips in conversation, the rest flows smoothly. It all seems so easy, were it not for the distant looks that sometimes cross Pat’s face, he’d call the night perfect. 

Time seems to pass quickly after that, the days lengthen to weeks, and before they all know it the season has started and god Pat and Temi are fucking perfect on the ice. There’s something seamless and efficient and beautiful about the way they play together, they’re so fucking happy too, Jonny wishes he was on their line, could light it up with them, but Q keeps him on first and them on second, and he’s fine with it, he gets to watch them play this way, gets to see every fucking moment of them together on the ice, and it chafes that he isn’t there with them, but he deals. They practice together, every moment on the ice that they can spare they gravitate towards each other, and it's a special kind of torment, Jonny doesn’t think he’s ever been so distracted at practice before but if anything they’re better for it; back with a vengeance and all that.

They find themselves spending every waking moment with each other off the ice too, and it leaves Jonny awash with all these indescribable feelings. He thought that there’d be hiccups along the way, and there are; but not in the ways he expected. Artemi (Temi, he insists) fits in with them like he’s always been there, its intrinsic and natural and he can’t help but think of those women down the street all those years ago, and it fills up his chest with warmth to think that’s what they’re like now. (It also fills his head with images of children, their children; but he holds his tongue, they’re so young, and even though it feels like they’ve been together forever, they haven’t, barely more than a month they’ve spent living in each others pockets, and they haven’t said anything to him about it, and - well, it's been on his mind.)

It surprising then, that the stutters in their rhythm come from Jonny and Pat. They spent so long being friends (just friends, only friends, never anything more, he couldn’t allow that, he couldn’t be selfish and hurt Pat that way; and that’s where the root of the problem lies, when they stutter and clash, Pat is quick to remind him that in the end that’s what hurt Pat anyway) that it’s hard to alter their default settings. When they’re curled up on the couch (Pat making them watch the fucking Twilight series again) and all he wants is to stroke his hands through Pat’s curls, he’ll end up struck stock still, unable to complete the action, a part of him still afraid of touching Pat like that, still stuck in that mode. Old habits die hard, and Jonny learns late at night, when they’re wrapped up in each other on Jonny’s stupidly big bed (platonically, they hadn’t; well, it hadn’t come up since that first frantic moment in the locker room, and he certainly wasn’t going to be the one to force the matter) that Pat sometimes feel guilty, an awful instinctual thing that crawls up on him while he isn’t looking, how wrong he felt for so long about his feelings for Jonny (and god does it burn, all Jonny wanted to do was keep Pat safe, protect him, and all he did was hurt him, hurt him worse he fears than what would have happened if he’d been honest from the start; it makes him want to scream and it expands in his chest, an awful mixture of shame and guilt and pain that rakes open his organs and grinds him up into pulp). Jonny spends hours with his pressed against the sprawl of his name on Pat’s collarbone, whispering his apologies.

It haunts them in a way, in the hesitance Jonny feels when he goes to touch Pat, in the heavy regret that sits perpetually in a headache behind his eyes, in the look Pat will sometimes turn towards Jonny, like he’s a stranger, like he doesn’t know if he can trust him. It’s messy, but every day they get a little bit past it. Temi helps, he’s this steady presence that has no shortness of love and affection to shower them with, he can draw Pat out of his darker moods, can soothe the wrinkles away from between his eyebrows, and always knows when Jonny is having a headache and appears with water and aspirin and gentle forehead kisses. 

It’s four months into their season (a little over four for their relationship) when Temi tells them enough is enough and all but throws Jonny onto their bed (theirs now, Temi hadn’t had much to begin with and it took less than a week before everything he owned was scattered across Jonny’s house; it took longer with Pat, a heavy, gradual thing that felt momentous when it was finally finished, he technically still has his apartment, but Jonny knows he hasn’t been back in nearly two weeks) and straddles him.

He looks over his shoulder to Pat; who’s standing next to the bed looking shocked and says, “We fuck, yeah?”

It draws a startled laugh out of Pat, who crawls up onto the bed with a smile and then, oh, fuck, they’re kissing and Jonny doesn’t think he’s ever been so hard in his entire life, holy shit. Temi feels him harden and pulls back from Pat (their lips separate with a soft smack and Jonny’s never going to be able to get the image of them kissing out of his head, ever again) to smirk teasingly at Jonny. They strip and rearrange, and there’s a moment of indecision of how they want this to go, but they eventually end up on their knees, Pat squished between them; Jonny’s chest sweat stuck to Pat’s back, leaning over his shoulder and kissing Temi, who’s already fumbling open a bottle of lube. 

After he’s smeared some on his hand and his dick, he pulls back from Jonny and tosses him the bottle, who barely has time to open it before he’s being dragged into a kiss from Pat. Temi wraps his big hand around his and Pat's dicks, starts stroking them teasingly. They spend some time like that; Jonny being pulled from Pat to Temi, lips spit slick and red, he fumbles down sightless to Pat’s ass, thumbs at his hole as long as he can get away with, before Pat’s makes an impatient noise and parts from him long enough to tell him to get on with it. He fingers him in earnest then, and Pat makes these keening, whispering noises that Jonny thought only happened in porn. He tries to pull back; he wants to see his fingers disappear into Pat’s greedy little hole, but Temi pulls him into another kiss before he can, keeps him there until Pat is practically crying and begging Jonny for his cock, mouth pressed close to Temi's neck, wetly panting out his desperation.

He draws back and just to make sure, says, “Could, fuck, could I-”, and Pat nods his head enthusiastically and says, “Yes, fuck, yes” before he can finish speaking. Jonny guides his dick towards Pat’s cheeks, he just needs the heat, needs the friction of Pat wrapped around him, his tight, wet heat. Then Artemi is grabbing each of Pat’s cheeks with his big hands and spreading him for Jonny’s cock and -

He can't stop laughing, Artemi is looking at him like he’s fucking crazy and Pat’s gone stiff beneath Jonny’s hands but he can't, fuck, Pat’s gonna be so mad. In between wheezing breaths Jonny manages, “It’s-, fuck, Artemi I, I found your mark.”

**Author's Note:**

> I'm sorry I just wanted a fic where Pat had a really embarrassing soul mark and then I made it unnecessarily angsty and it grew a little out of proportion.
> 
> I'm also like 90% I'm going to be continuing this; I have some things planned, so we'll see how that goes.
> 
> Thank you for reading! I hope you enjoyed.
> 
> And for anyone who cares; I have a tumblr I spend too much time on, same handle.


End file.
